Karen Burt Memorial Award
The Karen Burt Memorial Award is for the best newly qualified chartered engineer.
This Year’s Winner
2024 Winner: Kerry Evans
Kerry is an outstanding winner of the Karen Burt award for the best newly chartered engineer. Kerry is a Chartered Highways & Transportation engineer. Kerry’s commitment to engineering and raising the opportunity for women engineers is second to none. Kerry has spoken at two WES conferences sharing her story to inspire others and was part of the Women’s Aid presentation to WES members about domestic abuse. Whilst this sharing of experience has been challenging, Kerry is a passionate advocate for change pushing for workplace policies that support domestic abuse victims and survivors. Kerry began her journey into engineering at college and is currently working towards her PhD. Kerry’s PhD research aims to create a more inclusive and collaborative environment between civil engineering and environmental protection disciplines where she is committed to opening doors for women in these fields, ensuring they are seen, heard, and empowered to succeed. Kerry has chaired the Chartered Institution of Highways & Transportation (CIHT) annual dinner and enabled a balanced gender representation of VIPs and through her engineering work, she has made a pivotal difference in the safety of the Menai suspension bridge. Kerry is extraordinarily proud to be a woman engineer where she says everyday she knows there is something she does that benefits society, however small. Kerry’s irrepressible enthusiasm for women in engineering will inspire many others for years to come. Please join me in congratulating Kerry on her wonderful achievement as the Karen Burt award winner 2024.
Previous Winners
The 2022 winner: Emma Walton, Institute of Physics
Emma’s 25-year career has been spent in Physics and Engineering. With an MSc in Optics and a PhD in Liquid Crystal Opto-electronics she is an author of fifty patents and co-creator of several technologies commercialised on the mass-scale. She has travelled extensively in Asia to transfer new technology into production. Her career began with the consumer-electronics giant, Sharp, developing display- and solar-panel products. In 2007, she received a company award for her contributions to a new privacy display product ‘VeilView’. In 2013, she transitioned to the ‘lab-on-chip’ field, developing miniaturised devices for medical diagnostics and patenting important results that were key enablers for the company’s first product. In 2017, she joined lab-on-chip spin-out, Sharp Life Science and in 2018 was joint-first female to be promoted to Principal Engineer. In 2020, Emma joined Oxford Nanopore Technologies where she’s using her optical and mechanical expertise to develop next generation DNA/RNA sequencing products.
The 2021 winner: Eleanor Earl, Institution of Civil Engineers
The 2020 winner: Tina Gunnarsson, Institution of Civil Engineers
The 2019 winner: Mandy Lester, Institution of Chemical Engineering
The 2018 winner: Susan Deeny, Institution of Fire Engineers
The 2017 winner: Madeleine Jones, Institute of Chemical Engineering
The 2016 winner: Clare Lavelle, Energy Institute
The 2015 winner: Helen Randell, Institute of Civil Engineers
The 2014 Winner: Elaine Greaney, Institute of Engineering and Technology
The 2013 Winner: Professor Molly Stevens, Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining
The 2012 Winner: Kate Cooksey, Institution of Civil Engineers
The 2011 Winner: Dr Gemma Whatling, Institution of Mechanical Engineers
The 2010 Winner: Julie Templeton, Institution of Civil Engineers
The 2009 Winner: Katy Deacon, Institution of Engineering & Technology
The 2008 Winner: Emily Spearman, Institute of Energy
The 2007 Winner: Jane Hunter, Institution of Highway Engineers
The 2006 Winner: Louise Dougan (nee McDevitt), Institution of Highway Engineers
The 2005 Winner: Katy Roelich, Institution of Water and Environmental Management
The 2004 Winner: Suzanne Bland, Institution of Civil Engineers
The 2003 Winner: Jane Wild, Institution of Mechanical Engineers
The 2002 Winner: Helen Marson, Institution of Chemical Engineers
The 2001 Winner: Beth Hutchison, British Computer Society
The 2000 Winner: Una McQuaid, Institution of Civil Engineers
The 1999 Winner: Rebecca Dowsett, Institution of Electrical Engineers
Who was Karen Burt?
As an active member and Council office holder in The Women’s Engineering Society, Dr Karen Burt was a 
tireless campaigner for the recruitment and retention of women in science and engineering. From her own experience and her extensive research she was regarded as an expert in the management of career breaks and women ‘returners’ to engineering.
Karen graduated from Newnham College, Cambridge and obtained a PhD from Reading University in electron microscopy. She joined British Aerospace Systems at Stevenage as project engineer for scientific satellites and progressed to Senior Systems Engineer before developing an interest in management in the Total Quality Environment, and subsequently becoming Business Acquisition Manager.
Leaving BAe, she set up her own consultancy and was instrumental in establishing the Centre for Advanced Instrumentation Systems within University College, London. She had just accepted a position on the staff of UCL when her career was abruptly ended by a devastating stroke.
Karen is remembered as a gifted communicator and her fight to recover speech and mobility following her stroke was an inspiration to all who knew her.